Lightning
by i love alex
Summary: "What would I ever do without you?" He asks, his voice so soft she can barely hear it.


A/N: This fic completely took on a life of it's own, I started off wanting to do a quick little sweet thing but it just turned into this other…thing, really. Brace yourself for some angst. It follows where we left them making out on that counter in 2x14:

* * *

He growls into her ear. Literally growls and she's struggling to find a reason for him to not take her pants off. But the front door was still wide open and she thinks she needs to spend more than a minute in this house before she fucked her boyfriend against her parents kitchen counter in it.

"Tonight," She promises against the side of his face, kissing his cheek before she hops down off the counter top. He groans but reaches for her hand as she walked further into the room.

She avoids the bedroom to the far left completely (something he doesn't miss) and hangs her bag over the hook beside the armchair in what looked like the family's living room.

"I'm gonna go look outside." She says quietly, staring out through the glass.

"Okay." He whispers, watching as she grabbed a lone blanket from the couch without really look at it, still staring out the window. The way she walked, and touched things had a much softer familiarity to the way she touched things back home. Like she didn't have to think about it, only because she didn't want to.

He frowns when she steps outside, feeling how cold it was but then she's shutting the sliding door closed and he knows she needed just a little quiet right now, to let herself get used to being here from a distance. He knows what it feels like to have to walk into a living tomb, to have to be alive amongst possessions that belonged to the people you loved, the people who used to live.

He tears his eyes away from her and spends this time checking out the rest of the house. It was beautiful, he could definitely see the appeal but he could also see the grief. There were board games lying around, photos on the walls and when he opens the door to the room she didn't go in, his next breath is a little harder to get out. It was her parent's bedroom; her mother's perfumes were scattered on a drawer top, there were men's jackets still hanging on the closet door.

He sighs, dropping his head a little but he leaves the door open as he walks back out and heads for the patio.

"Having another moment?" He asks, walking up behind her; it was peaceful outside, with only the noises of the lake, the rest of the world being shut out by the forest.

She lets out a sigh when he slides his arms around her, moving her head against him as he kisses her cheek, "Jeremy broke his arm, diving off this dock…when he was six," She starts, smiling, "My dad taught me how to fish right off the edge over there." She points out towards the water bringing back her hand to clutch over his.

"So many memories…do you ever think about us? What our future will be like…_our _memories?"

He ducks his head to her shoulder for a moment; he's glad, almost, that they weren't looking at one another right now but then he wonders, holding her a little tighter, if maybe that's why she was bringing it up.

"Well I think there are a lot of conversations to be had about our future. About the kind of life we could have together." He whispers. He could hear how fast her heart was beating and it's easier to think about, it's easier to hold himself against than it is to let those vision start pouring in. Those visions he couldn't control seeing, those visions that just broke his heart.

"Well there's a…box that we probably shouldn't open." She says, the chuckle she's attempting, in order to mask how real they're future together, without each other, suddenly was becoming, dies out in her throat.

"No, we can open it. Whenever you're ready." He says, though he thinks they already have. Hopes that they haven't.

She lifts her head up, "No," She starts, shaking it. They hadn't come here to revel in reality. They had come here, with each other, to run away from it, "I'd rather just be here…now."

"You know this is a future memory," He whispers, shifting his head back a little to get closer to her ear, "It's where your boyfriend whispered in your ear that he loved you." And she smiles, her heart still heavy. His whisper of _I love you_ sends goose bumps that had nothing to do with the temperature, down her arms. He nuzzles his nose into her neck and kisses her there and it's fading away, those questions about their future, the brutality of it, as she can feel his smile spreading into her skin.

They don't stay out there much longer; she was beginning to shiver, swaying back against his chest, suddenly feeling tired.

She notices that the door to her parent's room is open when she's climbing off of the balcony landing. She freezes between the doorway.

"Did you…?" She asks, turning her head back a little as he came up behind her.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to leave it open, here…" He starts, gently moving around her and heading for the room.

"No!" She exclaims and his hand, reaching out for the handle, drops to his side, "No, it's okay…it's good, actually. I didn't want to have to open it myself."

He walks slowly back towards her and moves his hands around her waist to shut the sliding door, ducking down to kiss her forehead, "I can't go in there for you." He whispers, pressing his head to hers.

She stuffs her hands into the pockets of his sweatshirt and leans up to kiss his chin, "You already have." She says softly, lingering there for a moment before stepping around him.

"I'm going to take a nap."

He just nods, turning back around to watch her fix the blanket that was covering her shoulders, over herself along the couch, rolling into the cushions away from him.

By her breathing, she's asleep pretty quickly and he sits down on a chair just across from the couch and reaches for the book resting on the coffee table. It's Romeo and Juliet, ironically and he chuckles before opening it. He knows every line, page by page but it'd be nice to let his mind wonder for awhile and not have to think.

He's halfway through the second time reading it when she stirs and rolls herself off the couch, walking heavily towards him and onto his lap, shoving the book away.

"Mmmm." She groans into his neck, still sleepy and he laughs, bringing his arms around her back.

"I'm sorry." She mutters, fingering the collar of his shirt.

"For what?" He asks softly, as he begins to rub circles across her back.

She shrugs, "I don't know. I'm just sorry."

He kisses her temple, "Well you don't have to be." He sighs a little, feeling like he could take a nap himself, she was warm and comfortable against him.

"You do think about it…don't you, a lot?" She suddenly asks, without looking at him but he turns, shifts them so she has to.

"No." He says too quickly, his eyebrows creasing and she brings both hands to his face, cupping his cheeks.

"Am I alive?" She asks as he shuts his eyes and brings his forehead to rest against hers, "When you think about the future, am I alive?"

"Of course you are." He breathes, "Of course."

And she slowly crawls her way off him, comes to stand on her feet. She sticks out her hand for him to take which he does, wrapping his arms around her waist, now kissing along her collarbone. She moans softly and folds her legs around his.

"Then this is another future memory." She says just as he peels away her shirt.

They make love on the floor just as the suns going down and it's slow and lazy, all skin-to-skin. She doesn't muffle the way she comes, staring up at his face but he kisses her and her moan hits against him, reverberates so that it suddenly feels like his heart has just spread into her skin.

But he thinks, as they lay there naked, tangled in each other, that maybe it's where it's always been.

* * *

The dinner he makes is, in a word, _amazing._ She has three helpings. It's not that he doesn't like cooking; it's just that he never really gets the chance do it but she almost thinks about begging him to become a chief. He was _that_ good.

"I wish the weather was warmer, we could go swimming."

They were lounging in the living room, the dishes from dinner still on the table but there was no real rush to get to them just yet. Plus, her stomach was so full that the thought of moving at all right now was pure agony.

"Naked?" He asks, wriggling his eyebrows, laughing loudly when she rolls her eyes and reaches for a pillow to throw at his face.

"No, perv man…although I've never actually done that before."

She's not surprised (_at all_) when she hears the, 'I have' but gives him a bemused expression nevertheless.

He laughs a little before coming forward in his chair, resting his arms on his knees, "With Lexi, in Italy. We were…drunk."

She grins, just imagining it, "What year?"

"1999. It was New Years night. We usually spent New Years Eve together but she was off with Lee." His smile fades a little and he sits back in the chair, clamping his hands together over his chest.

She knows if she asks the question she wants to, they'd end up right back in the place they had only avoided hours before but lately, she's feeling too brave to ignore things so important.

"Do you know the story…of how he turned, what made him finally decide?"

Lee's words suddenly rush through her head, '_If you wanna be with someone forever, you have to live forever' _and they're dizzying and grounding all at the same time.

"Elena, " Stefan starts and stands from the chair, coming over to kneel by her head, "We're here, now, okay? We are right here. Of course I have thought about it but I'm not strong enough, okay? I'm not strong enough right now for you to tell me no, for you to tell me yes."

She has tears in her eyes as she sits up and she puts her legs on either side of his waist, "Maybe, you won't have to hear either." She kisses him softly before standing and walks towards her parent's bedroom, turning off the light.

He blindly follows, his heart hammering in his ears and slides into bed beside her. It's quiet for a while but neither of them were quiet ready to admit they weren't asleep.

"What would I ever do without you?" He asks, his voice so soft she can barely hear it.

She rolls over and puts a hand on his stomach, over his heart, "What you did before we met." She whispers gently, watching him as he stared now up at the ceiling.

"That wasn't living…before you, that was…I don't remember what that was. I don't remember how to be without you."

She knows she's about to cry, her heart is aching but she takes her hand and brings it to his face, trying to get him to look at her.

"You're talking like I'm going somewhere soon, like I'm planning on leaving you."

And his eyes finally meet hers, his expression so clear and cutting through the dark that she can see his tears, _'Well' _he says silently, _'Aren't you?'_

She quickly moves herself against his chest, so that they were practically nose to nose and grabs his face, her eyes filling with tears, "Listen to me, " She starts, swallowing through the lump in her throat, "The reason we're not talking about our future right now isn't because I think I'm going to be taken away from you or be killed in the sacrifice and it isn't because I haven't decided whether to turn or not. Maybe I have….It's because I'm terrified at how unclear it all is and right now, the only clear thing that I know is how much I love you. _That _is my future, Stefan. Loving you is my future, that's why I don't need to talk about it right now."

He kisses her, her warm tears melting into his cheeks as his arms wrapped tightly around her. They don't speak again that night but they don't really have to. She said it all; they're future was loving each other.

Maybe it wasn't a solid answer or decision but it was real and that was more important than anything else.

* * *

A/N: Completely drained after that but I'll try my hardest to get another fic from 2x15 up some time tomorrow. Thank you guys!


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